


All for a Hill of Beans

by anneapocalypse



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-17
Updated: 2016-05-23
Packaged: 2019-01-16 11:01:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12341352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anneapocalypse/pseuds/anneapocalypse
Summary: A collection of short vignettes about a sole survivor and her various identities.





	1. Secrets

“You’re an oooold vaultie, aren’t you? Lot older than you look.”

Holly shrugs, stepping around debris as they make their way through a back alley, not meeting his eyes. “No.”

“Now come on, Professor. Obvious lying is my schtick, not yours.”

She looks up abruptly. “Does Dez know?”

Deacon quirks an eyebrow. “Do you not want her to know?”

Holly sighs. Picks her cap up off her head and runs a hand through her hair before settling it back in place. “I don’t want to be the Bicentennial Wonder, Deacon. That’s not my style and besides, there are more than a few ghouls around here as old as I am, and with the life experience to go with it. Yeah. I was born before the war, before the bombs. I saw all of it. I lived in a painstakingly constructed suburban bubble because I did weapons research that helped destroy the world." And you know what I’ve got to show for it? A fake marriage and a dead baby.”

“You, uh.” Deacon moves with excruciating nonchalance, his tone as pointedly casual as ever. “You never mentioned the dead baby before.”

Holly shrugs. “Don’t like talking about it.”

“That’s… understandable.”

“You don’t know the half of it.” He doesn’t. For all he knows about her–and he knows a lot–there’s some things she’s fairly certain he doesn’t. And until he decides to spill a few of his own beans, Holly keeps hers close. It’s the game they play. Only fair.

Deacon makes a curious noise. “Huh.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shoutout to [this tumblr post](http://puckish-saint.tumblr.com/post/138635522495/captionless-version-here-long-post-ahead-i-wanna) for some great meta and speculation on the suburban bubble that is Sanctuary Hills.


	2. Faces

“So how many people  _are_ you, these days?” Deacon asks casually over a precious cup of their strictly rationed coffee at HQ. Smoke all you want, Dez declares, taking her own advice. Conserve the caffeine. Cigs are a dime a dozen out there. Beans are finite and not cheap. They extract a single six-ounce cup and split it. Three ounces each.

She thinks: General Holiday, the Silver Shroud, the Professor, and now Knight Waverly. She sips, letting the bitter drink sit on her tongue before swallowing. What will be next?

She says: “Oh, about four, I think. How many are you?”

Deacon swallows his coffee carelessly, setting his cup down. “Ah, that’s different. I’m not really distinct about it. I’m a vest and a hat, then I’m the pomp and some leather. Flannel and boots.” He laughs. “I don’t flesh out my characters. Point is to be forgotten. You–people remember you.” He waggles his eyebrows, and Holly smiles through a vague unease she can’t name. “Every one of you.”

They’re not just characters, she wants to say, rubbing her thumb around the edge of the cup. But that isn’t right. The Shroud, the Knight, are for sure. She thinks of Kent’s frightened voice on the radio,  _Do it, Shroud, do it–_  Thinks of Danse, his  _off the record_  chats. She stops herself there.

She wants to ask if it’s easier, shuffling costumes and faces like a deck of cards, easier than the hard split from one person into two, and from two into four, and from four into who knows how many more. If it’s easier to be a nameless blur, than to feel the half of you preparing to betray the other half.

He wouldn’t have an answer, so she sips her coffee, and she doesn’t ask.


	3. Lies

On the roof of CIT, at twilight, she comes as close as she’s ever come to blowing her cover.

Not for whatever maternal affection he tries to awaken in her–in awakening the possibility that it might true, that the child she and Nate adopted could be alive and standing before her. She almost goes over the edge not for  _love_ , or  _affection_ , certainly not for the lie of genetics, but to tell him he’s  _wrong._  Like a mother would, perhaps. A mother disappointed, a mother angry. A mother who would’ve goddamn well raised you better.

(He doesn’t even know Shaun wasn’t her genetic son. Wouldn’t he have done a test to be sure…? But why corrupt the lie with  _facts_.)

She was just an experiment, anyway, that’s what he’s saying, and yet something sticks in her,  _Mother_ , unsettling all the pieces of herself, prying them apart. She unfocuses her eyes from his, watches the skyline behind him and feels a terrible vertigo.

“Bunker Hill did not go well for us,” he says, and just like that, he  _changes,_  going cold and stern, becoming  _Father_  again, and just like that the pieces of herself slide back into place. Layers, and many, but none of them askew. The General sworn to protect the people, the operative sworn to protect the synths, the spy with eyes and ears in the right places to keep it all from going tits-up.

There’s room for  _mother_  in that, but that room isn’t unconditional either. Any more than his–whatever he has for her. It certainly isn’t love. But it isn’t about love, anyway.

It doesn’t matter, does it, if he’s Shaun? To be a parent is an  _act_ , not an inherent state of being. She and Nate knew that. They weren’t lovers–it wasn’t about love then either–but they chose that, that they would raise that child. And the child they would’ve raised is dead.

And so she lies. She lies and lies and it’s easy, because she isn’t his mother, and he isn’t her son.


	4. Regrets

“Good work, Paladin. Are you ready to take on another trainee?” **  
**

“Actually, Captain, I had something a little different in mind. I was hoping I might take the Squires out as a group on a little field trip. Nowhere dangerous. I’ve scouted the perfect spot for a little group camp-out. Perfect for some survival skills training and team building.”

“That’s a bold idea, Paladin.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And you’ve always been good with the youth. Many of the squires look up to you. Very well, Paladin. Permission granted, provided you submit the coordinates for your planned expedition so that our scouts can ensure the safety of the children. They are our future, you know.”

“Very good, Captain. Thank you.”

* * *

“Wow! This place is huge! Is that a Nuka-Cola machine?”

“It certainly is, Squire. Why don’t you go and grab yourself a soda.”

“Awesome! We’re not allowed to drink Nuka on the Prydwen.”

A dozen young Squires spill onto the pavilion at Sanctuary, whooping and hollering and chasing the friendly German shepard who runs circles around them, panting with delight at so many new friends. Preston Garvey meets General Holiday by the snack bar where she and Cait have begun gently corraling the children, plying them with gum drops and soda pop and potato crisps. Even the Brotherhood can’t train out every childish delight. Preston offers her a gentle smile. “This is all of them?”

The General nods, returning a smile that doesn’t quite make it up to her eyes as they walk a few paces away. “Every child under twelve.” Her expression grows somber. “It was the best I could do. There are a few other individuals I’m trying to pull strings for. To make sure they’re off the Prydwen when…”

Preston nods. “They’ll be safe here, General. I can promise you that. We’re the best-defended settlement in the Commonwealth.”

She sighs. “It’s not what outside the walls that I’m worried about.”

“I know,” Preston says, gravely. “But Holly… you’re doing the right thing.”

Holly’s mouth pinches into a grim line. “I sure hope so.”

* * *

“Might regret that someday, you know.”

Holly slows her pace, unstartled by the figure that slips out of the shadow of the bridge to join her as she starts east from Sanctuary on foot. “Hi, Deacon.”

“Not that I don’t get it. Because seriously, I get it. But kids can have long memories. And they’re going to figure out what happened, sooner or later.”

The Professor nods. “I know.”

“Still, you do what you think is right. If nothing else, Holiday, I know I trust you.”

She shakes her head, quickens her pace, and doesn’t reply.


End file.
